Watcher of WeaselsKeeping an eye on the weasels of the world2015-03-30T08:35:23Zhttp://www.watcherofweasels.org/feed/atom/JoshuaPundithttp://joshuapundit.blogspot.com/http://www.watcherofweasels.org/?p=50762015-03-30T08:35:23Z2015-03-30T08:35:23Z

Every week on Monday morning , the Council and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher’s Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week’s question: What’s Your Take on The Bowe Bergdahl Situation? What Will The Outcome Be?The Glittering Eye : As Lord Sankey said in 1935, the presumption of innocence is the golden thread that runs through the criminal law. That is as true of our code of military justice as it is of our civil code. I’m concerned that too many are forgetting that in the case of Bowe Berdahl. Let the case work its way through the courts. That’s what hearings and trials are for.

I do find it interesting that the editors of the New York Times a) assume that Berdahl is guilty and b) think he should be absolved from that for political reasons. There is another ancient legal dictum that covers that: fiat justitia ruat caelum or let justice be done though the heavens fall.Wolf Howling : On the night of June 30, 2009, Army Spc. Bowe Bergdahl, then stationed in Afghanistan at Outpost Keating, left a note in his tent stating “he was leaving to start a new life.” Bergdahl left his post and made his way into the surrounding countryside, committing a textbook act of desertion per the UCMJ. The Taliban soon made Bergdahl their prisoner.

In the immediate aftermath of his desertion, Bergdahl’s battalion engaged in repeated efforts to find him in operations that claimed the lives of six soldiers. Moreover, Army Command made a decision that Outpost Keating, then slated for closure, should remain open as a base from which to search for Bergdahl. On October 3, 2009, the base was subjected to the one of the largest and bloodiest attacks of the Afghan War, in what has become known as the Battle of Kamdesh. The battle resulted in eight more American soldiers killed and twenty-seven wounded.

The Obama administration, at some point, began secret negotiations with the Taliban for the return of Bergdahl. In violation of U.S. law, the Obama administration agreed to a prisoner exchange with the Taliban without timely notifying Congress. Despite that, the Obama administration claiming general power to act under the Constitution, unilaterally authorized the deal. On May 31, 2014, Bergdahl was exchanged for five top Taliban commanders who, until then, were being held at the Guantanamo Bay prison facility.

My take is that Bergdahl should be tried for desertion and, if found guilty, be jailed for life. I also believe that Obama’s decision to trade for Bergdahl was part of a larger plan to close Gitmo, but that pushback in the wake of this trade will stop that. Obama, who has made an industry out of violating the Constitution and the laws of our nation, will suffer no penalty for this trade because Congress is too supine to force the issue. Most if not all of the Taliban Five will return to their positions in the Taliban to again plan the death and destruction of Americans.

At the Daily Caller, W. James Antle III opines on one other possible fallout:

The charges against Bowe Bergdahl are not merely embarrassing to the White House. They will further undermine the already shaky confidence in the Obama administration’s nuclear negotiations with Iran.

I don’t see that. The Iran negotiations are orders of magnitude more important than the Bergdahl situation, which is little more than a flash in the pan in the grander scheme of things. Obama has already given the nation countless grounds to mistrust his judgment and veracity as regards the Iran negotiations. The administration’s prevarications and poor judgment as regards Bergdahl are merely more straws on a camels back that is already broken. In the very near future, no one will remember this but as one more sad footnote in the history of the Obama administration. At least, that is, until new American deaths can be traced to the recently released members of the Taliban Five, as seems a certainty. Then the impotent howling will commence yet again.

JoshuaPundit : I pretty much said what I had to say here. The Army had to be dragged kicking and screaming into prosecuting this human detritus because the top brass have all seen what happens to generals whom don’t toe the party line…they get booted out. The Army knew as far back as 2010 when the Pentagon originally investigated this that Bergdahl willfully deserted his post, but they’ve kept stalling. The Army even postponed charging Bergdahl until after the 2014 midterms.

So our our commander-in-chief paid a nice ransom and freed 5 top Taliban commanders from Club Gitmo who have undoubtedly been responsible for more attacks on our troops in AfPak now that they’re free. It also doesn’t surprise me that the Obama regime knew Bergdahl was a deserter but lied to the American people about him ‘serving with honor and distinction.’ They simply don’t care anymore, having gotten away with this kind of thing so many times at this point.

The Army does surprise me though, just a bit. Considering that Bergdahl put his unit in danger and that Bergdahl was directly responsible for the deaths of at least 5 other soldiers whom died trying to find him. I’m convinced the only reason they finally charged him was because this was so blatant it would have resulted in a major morale and discipline issue if they had just swept it under the rug, as they were obviously told to. At that, what we’ve actually got here is not the prelude to a court martial
but the military equivalent of a ‘grand jury’, to stretch this out for months so the end result can be more or less buried.

The end result? They’ll obviously have to try him, whether they want to or not. There’s just too much evidence, including a little love note he wrote before he left. I’m assuming they will not consider AfPak as actual wartime, so a violation of Article 28 of the UCMJ calls for 2-5 years imprisonment, a dishonorable discharge and loss of all pay and benefits.

By time he’s actually sentenced, at worst he’ll probably get two years , and it will be close enough to January 2017 that he’ll merit a presidential pardon or commutation of sentence after serving a few months. when you compare this with how the Pendleton 8 were treated,(all of them were acquitted after going through sheer hell) it makes you wonder…

Article 85 is “desertion with intent to shirk important or hazardous duty.” It carries a maximum potential punishment of a dishonorable discharge, reduction to the rank of private, total forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and five years in prison.

Article 99 is “misbehavior before the enemy by endangering the safety of a command, unit or place.” It carries a maximum potential penalty of dishonorable discharge, reduction to the rank of private, total forfeiture of all pay and allowances, and life in prison.

The UCMJ defines desertion as intent to leave a unit “permanently.”

Army officials associated with Bergdahl’s legal case cannot discuss or disclose the findings of the 2014 investigation while legal actions are pending “out of respect to the judicial process, the rights of the accused and to ensure the proceeding’s fairness and impartiality.”

The date of the hearing has not been announced.

An Article 32 preliminary hearing is similar to a civilian grand jury inquiry. It is designed to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to merit a court-martial.

Based on the outcome of the hearing, a general court-martial convening authority will decide whether to refer charges to a general court-martial, refer the charges to a special court-martial, dismiss the charges, or take any other action deemed appropriate.

One important difference in the military process is that the defendant and defense counsel are present for the hearing and can cross-examine witnesses.

Without a confession from Bergdahl, military lawyers would need to rely on circumstantial evidence to prove his intent, including statements from members of his unit and Afghan villagers who may have come in contact with him after he left the U.S. base.

Depending on the outcome of the Article 32 hearing, Bergdahl’s attorney, could request an administrative solution to his client’s case by requesting that the military discharge Bergdahl in lieu of a court-martial.

Most likely, that is what will happen – a less than honorable discharge.

Personally, “Death To Traitors” may be apropos.

Also, tons of speculation that the Taliban 5 swap for Bergdahl may be the 1st step to shutting down enemy detentions at Guantanamo Bay.

Bookworm Room: In June 2009, when Bowe Bergdahl vanished, those who were paying attention already knew that he was a deserter at best or a collaborator at worst. His reputation amongst his fellow troops was terrible and, as his email correspondence with his father was being made public, it was obvious that Bergdahl wasn’t simply a lost sheep.

By the time of his release from Taliban hands, in May 2014, the military had, not only lost six good men searching for him, it had also had ample time to study everything about Bergdahl’s life until the point of his captivity — and to get to know his family. His father is quite manifestly a Muslim convert, with his beard and headdress and Pashtun and Arabic prayers. Or he has a really, really, bizarre variation of Stockholm Syndrome, to the point at which he’s identifying with his son’s hosts or captors, depending on which story one believes.

Obama knew all of this, and yet he took Bergdahl back in exchange for five men who undoubtedly have killed many Americans and who, know free, will undoubtedly kill many more. Not only that, but he had his mouthpieces fan out and knowingly tell Americans the lie that Bergdahl served honorably and vanished bravely.

Summed up: At all times relevant to Bergdahl’s release, it was manifestly obvious based upon the widely available evidence — almost all of it from Bergdahl’s and his father’s own keyboards — that this was an act of desertion, pure and simple.

So why the “desertion” charge now? This is going to be a show trial. Bergdahl’s lawyers are already claiming (a) that it’s the military’s fault for allowing him to enlist in the first place; and/or (b) that he was trying to be a good soldier by departing in the dark of night, without any of his equipment, to report to another base about infractions on his base. The military tribunal, assuming it’s been properly staffed with “good soldiers,” will accept one or the other of these defenses, and Bergdahl will vanish into obscurity.

Laura Rambeau Lee,Right Reason: Since the Bowe Bergdahl trade last May with the Taliban for five high value enemy combatants held at Guantanamo Bay, many of us were under the impression an Article 32 investigation was underway. The announcement on March 25th reveals that what the Army was conducting all this time was an Article 15-6 investigation, which is a non-judicial investigation utilized for lesser crimes committed while in the military.

We now know Bergdahl has been charged with “desertion with intent to shirk important or hazardous duty” as well as “misbehavior before the enemy.” These charges mean now Bergdahl might receive an Article 32 hearing, essentially like a civilian grand jury hearing, to determine if there is enough evidence to proceed to a court-martial.

Many who have been following the case heard statements from his platoon members, who all appear to agree Bergdahl deserted his post and should be court-martialed. Possibly half a dozen of his platoon mates lost their lives looking for Bergdahl.

After all the fanfare with President Obama and Bergdahl’s family in the White House Rose Garden, and with Susan Rice stating on national television that “he served the United States with honor and distinction”, the political pressure on the military must be intense to make this case go away.

I suspect the outcome of this will be Bergdahl’s attorney will ask for, and the Army will grant, an administrative discharge, avoiding an Article 32 hearing altogether. This means he will receive an “other than honorable” discharge and will not serve any jail time.

What is most disturbing is that our military, caving under the political pressure of this administration, delayed and continues to delay bringing the Bergdahl desertion case to court martial.

Well, there you have it!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum. and every Tuesday morning, when we reveal the weeks’ nominees for Weasel of the Week!

And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.

It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it…or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?

The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and the results are in for this week’s Watcher’s Council match up.

“Too much of what is called ‘education’ is little more than an expensive isolation from reality.” – Thomas Sowell

“Academia is to knowledge what prostitution is to love; close enough on the surface but, to the nonsucker, not exactly the same thing.” – Nassim Nicholas Taleb

“Without education, we are in a horrible and deadly danger of taking educated people seriously.” - GK Chesterson

This week’s winning essay,Bookworm Room’s – When it comes to campus fascism, revolutions always eat their own is a tour de force on how radicalism is taking 0ver America’s college campuses. Here’s a slice:One of the truisms I grew up hearing is that “revolutions always eat their own.” I have understood this to mean that, in any revolutionary movement, the second generation, having been marinated longer in the revolutionary brine, is more extreme than the first generation and invariably purges that first generation. Both the French and the Russian revolutions prove this point.

We in America have had a revolution too. It’s been a very slow-moving revolution of the kind that the British used to call a Fabian Revolution. It involves advancing revolutionary goals, not through violence, but through slow, reformist means. As Ferguson shows, the violence then comes after the revolution. Indeed, Ferguson is one of the best manifestations of that revolution.

The other obvious manifestation is the American college campus. On campuses throughout America, a Nanny state fascism is the norm. That didn’t happen overnight. It happened through Fabian gradualism, with hard-Left revolutionary principles being slowly introduced in the classrooms (increasingly open, aggressive Marxist teaching), in the administrative buildings (read Heather MacDonald’s Multiculti U for the best discussion about the hard Left Fabianism in college administration), and in the dorms (which had a slow Progression away from same-sex dorms, same-sex floors, same-sex bathrooms, and same-sex rooms, which a completely unsurprisingly commensurate uptick in rape claims).

One of the biggest slow-mo revolutions in academia was the whole concept of trigger warnings. When the idea got started, nobody said that trigger warnings were going to be censorship. Instead, they were sold as good manners and sensitivity. It’s kind and polite to warn people who might have delicate sensibilities that you’re going to talk about something shocking, such as mass murder, or blood, or something else most people agree is disgusting or revolting. It turned out, though, that at the average college campus an amazing number of kids have heightened sensibilities. More interestingly, it also happened that, thanks to the Leftism in which America’s young have been pickled since preschool, the things that they just can’t bear to hear without horrific mental suffering are facts and ideas that run counter to their Leftist ideology.

One of the biggest slow-mo revolutions in academia was the whole concept of trigger warnings. When the idea got started, nobody said that trigger warnings were going to be censorship. Instead, they were sold as good manners and sensitivity. It’s kind and polite to warn people who might have delicate sensibilities that you’re going to talk about something shocking, such as mass murder, or blood, or something else most people agree is disgusting or revolting. It turned out, though, that at the average college campus an amazing number of kids have heightened sensibilities. More interestingly, it also happened that, thanks to the Leftism in which America’s young have been pickled since preschool, the things that they just can’t bear to hear without horrific mental suffering are facts and ideas that run counter to their Leftist ideology.

Over the last few months, however, something interesting has happened: The Fabian revolution’s Founders are getting disgusted with their progeny’s extremism. It began when Jonathan Chait questioned the stifling effects of the new orthodoxy. In his article challenging the orthodoxy, he still oozed contempt for conservatives having a say in things, but he was definitely perturbed by modern young people’s inability to tolerate any opposing opinions, ideas, or facts. I wonder if Chait was surprised by the subsequent Leftist demand that he be silenced.

I certainly appreciate the effort these old revolutionaries are making to stem the flood waters they first let loose. I doubt they’ll be successful, though. I see them as this revolution’s Robespierres. He, of course, ended up on the same guillotine to which he had so mercilessly consigned others.

Apparently Israel’s election isn’t the only one this president is trying to subvert. Read about his deliberate schemes to do his best to oust another friend of the West in Nigeria and replace him with a Muslim with ties to Islamists, including Boko Haram.

Here are this week’s full results. Only Ask Marion was unable to vote this week, but was not subject to the normal 2/3 penalty for not voting:

Fourth place *t* with 2/3 votes -Gates Of Vienna–The Club Of Hate submitted by The Noisy Room

See you next week!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum. and every Tuesday morning, when we reveal the weeks’ nominees for Weasel of the Week!

And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it...or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?

Every Tuesday, the Council nominates some of the slimiest, most despicable characters in public life for some deed of evil, cowardice or corruption they’ve performed. Then we vote to single out one particular Weasel for special mention, to whom we award the statuette of shame, our special, 100% plastic Golden Weasel. This week’s nominees were all truly slime-worthy and disgusting,but in the end the unanimous winner was….the envelope please..

White House Chief Of Staff And Israel Basher Denis McDonough!

JoshuaPundit : Well, yah gets yer orders and yah follows ‘em, but even cops and football players say ‘no’ sometimes. But not at the Obama White House, nossir!

McDonough’s orders were to front for the president and amplify his childish tantrum after all those millions of dollars and ACORN-style campaigning complete with Chicago-style vote buying by his favorite operatives wasn’t enough to defeat Benyamin Netanyahu in the Israeli elections.

Obama and his friends even tried to pull the race card on Bibi because he had the temerity to tell the Israeli public what was going on, that Arab voters known to belong to factions hostile to Israel ( the Parties on the so-called Arab List) were being bussed in to vote Labor for lunch and a hundred shekels funded by foreign sources.

And to be realistic about saying that there was no possibility now of a two-state solution with Abbas’s rejectionism and Fatah’s alliance with Hamas in the mix.

So what was McDonough’s assignment? To be President Obama’s surrogate at the far left group J-Street’s national conference and bash Israel as part of Obama’s amen chorus, McDonough followed through like a real champ, denouncing Netanyahu, what he called ‘Israel’s 50-year occupation’ and pimped for that mythical two state solution along the indefensible pre-67 lines, including dividing Jerusalem.

And he also did a fair amount of pimping for the president’s non-existent, non-binding super dooper Iran Nukes deal and of course spent some time bashing Republicans. It all got a big standing O from the Jay Streeters, After all, why wouldn’t they? The group was formed and funded by Obama and George Soros to provide cover for the Regime’s anti-Israel stance.

I really don’t mind folks like McDonough or even our president spouting this bilge. What annoys me most is when they try to insist they’re ‘pro-Israel’ and that ‘they’re only interested in Israel ‘s security,’ that making a nukes deal with people like the Iranians is anything but appeasement and an invitation to another Holocaust.

That’s where the weaselness comes in, the outright lies and pretending.Anyone with any common sense knows that they know they’re lying. McDonough wasn’t alone, but he did his bit for the Regime this week, and I think he ought to be commended for it.

As I’ve said before, this award condemns weaselness. Denis McDonough started on his path to this award many years ago.

He came to public life as an adviser to the far Left senator and tax cheat Tom Daschele, who was, shall we say, not exactly pro-Israel. Understandable of course since Daschele himself was a protege’ of vociferously anti-Israel Senator James Abourezk. Afterwards, Daschele went to work for the radical Left wing Soros funded think tank, The Center For American Progress. Daschele hired McDonough at the CAP as a ‘senior fellow.’

McDonough actually became involved as part of Obama’s minions as a senior foreign policy adviser during the Bamster’s first term, so obviously his views and those of the president really jibed on Israel. His promotion to White House Chief of Staff isn’t exactly a foreign policy post, but no doubt McDonough was happy to help bash Israel for his boss.

Again, the weaselness comes not from whatever he believes, but from the deliberate lies, the repetition of things he has to know are untrue. And his avid willingness to do so.

Here’s your weasel, sir. Oh, the engraving on the Weasel? That’s Hebrew and we had it done especially for you. אידיוט is a well known Hebrew phrase of endearment and respect, they tell me…

Well, there it is!

Check back next Tuesday to see who next week’s nominees for Weasel of the Week are!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum, and remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it...or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?

Welcome to the Watcher’s Council, a blogging group consisting of some of the most incisive blogs in the ‘sphere, and the longest running group of its kind in existence. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.Then we vote on the best two posts, with the results appearing on Friday morning.

You can, too! Want to see your work appear on the Watcher’s Council homepage in our weekly contest listing? Didn’t get nominated by a Council member? No worries.

To bring something to my attention, simply head over to Joshuapundit and post the title and a link to the piece you want considered along with an e-mail address (mandatory, but of course it won’t be published) in the comments section no later than Monday 6PM PST in order to be considered for our honorable mention category. Then return the favor by creating a post on your site linking to the Watcher’s Council contest for the week when it comes out on Wednesday morning

Simple, no?

It’s a great way of exposing your best work to Watcher’s Council readers and Council members while grabbing the increased traffic and notoriety. And how good is that, eh?

It’s time once again for the Watcher’s Council’s ‘Weasel Of The Week’ nominations, where we pick our choices to compete for the award of the famed Golden Weasel to a public figure who particularly deserves to be slimed and mocked for his or her dastardly deeds during the week. Every Tuesday morning, tune in for the Weasel of the Week nominations!

The “war tax” will be one of the first Sanders will introduce during the vote-a-rama next week. During the back-to-back votes, senators are allowed to submit an unlimited amount of amendments.

“The Republicans took us into protracted wars in Afghanistan and Iraq — and ran up our national debt by trillions because they chose not to pay for those wars. Instead, they put the cost of those wars on our national credit card,” Sanders said in a statement Friday.

Like Obama had nothing to with that particular tab. His memory is selective and full of holes. Spoken like a true and committed Marxist… Sanders never wavers as a very died in the red weasel.

Russian Ambassador To Denmark, Mr. Warmth, Mikhail Vanin!

The Independent Sentinel :I was going to nominate the Ayatollah as a weasel for saying, “Of course Death to America, in response to his audience chanting “Death to America” while he insulted America. However, that’s too easy so I picked Mikhail Vanin who threatened to bomb Denmark’s warships.

From Reuters:

In an interview in the newspaper Jyllands-Posten, the Russian ambassador to Denmark, Mikhail Vanin, said he did not think Danes fully understood the consequences of joining the program.“If that happens, Danish warships will be targets for Russian nuclear missiles,” Vanin told the newspaper.“Denmark will become a part of the threat against Russia. It will be less peaceful, and relations with Russia will be damaged,” Vanin said, adding that Russia has missiles which would be able to penetrate the future missile shield.

I think what the Danes should do is move their warships to Brighton Beach!

White House Chief Of Staff And Israel Basher Denis McDonough!

JoshuaPundit : Well, yah gets yer orders and yah follows ‘em, but even cops and football players say ‘no’ sometimes. But not at the Obama White House, nossir!

McDonough’s orders were to front for the president and amplify his childish tantrum after all those millions of dollars and ACORN-style campaigning complete with Chicago-style vote buying by his favorite operatives wasn’t enough to defeat Benyamin Netanyahu in the Israeli elections.

Obama and his friends even tried to pull the race card on Bibi because he had the temerity to tell the Israeli public what was going on, that Arab voters known to belong to factions hostile to Israel ( the Parties on the so-called Arab List) were being bussed in to vote Labor for lunch and a hundred shekels funded by foreign sources.

And to be realistic about saying that there was no possibility now of a two-state solution with Abbas’s rejectionism and Fatah’s alliance with Hamas in the mix.

So what was McDonough’s assignment? To be President Obama’s surrogate at the far left group J-Street’s national conference and bash Israel as part of Obama’s amen chorus, McDonough followed through like a real champ, denouncing Netanyahu, what he called ‘Israel’s 50-year occupation’ and pimped for that mythical two state solution along the indefensible pre-67 lines, including dividing Jerusalem.

And he also did a fair amount of pimping for the president’s non-existent, non-binding super dooper Iran Nukes deal and of course spent some time bashing Republicans. It all got a big standing O from the Jay Streeters, After all, why wouldn’t they? The group was formed and funded by Obama and George Soros to provide cover for the Regime’s anti-Israel stance.

I really don’t mind folks like McDonough or even our president spouting this bilge. What annoys me most is when they try to insist they’re ‘pro-Israel’ and that ‘they’re only interested in Israel ‘s security,’ that making a nukes deal with people like the Iranians is anything but appeasement and an invitation to another Holocaust.

That’s where the weaselness comes in, the outright lies and pretending.Anyone with any common sense knows that they know they’re lying. McDonough wasn’t alone, but he did his bit for the Regime this week, and I think he ought to be commended for it.

Well, there it is. What a despicable group of Weasels…ANY OF THEM COULD WIN! Check back Thursday to see which Weasel walks off with the statuette of shame!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum.

And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it...or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know

Every week on Monday morning , the Council and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher’s Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week’s question: Is America In Decline? Why Or Why Not?

Wolf Howling : It is beyond question that our nation is in decline. We stand mired in historic levels of debt, yet massive deficit spending by Congress continues unabated. Regulations are being pumped out by unelected bureaucrats at record pace, working fundamental changes to our nation that could never pass Congress. Yet Congress sits by and the odd Congress critter only occasionally complains in speeches. Medicare and Social Security threaten to bankrupt our nation in the foreseeable future unless reformed, yet Congress does not just nothing, but manages to compound the problems with Obamacare. We have a tyrannical President who unconstitutionally threatens our country’s make up by unilaterally legislating the legalization of millions of illegal aliens, while an utterly supine Congress with the sole Constitutional authority to legislate is allowing this to happen. It appears that elections for either party no longer matter to change our national trajectory. Our Supreme Court today sits as a sort of unelected Politburo deciding that the Constitution means whatever five of them want it to mean based on their whim of the day. What was supposed to be the least dangerous of our co-equal branches of government is now arguably the most dangerous. The left is using our military as a laboratory for insane social experiments, the worst being to allow women into front line combat units, something that can only be accomplished in any number by lowering the physical standards. And that does not even begin to consider the impact on unit cohesion. Space exploration as well as virtually everything to do with space is without doubt of incredible importance to our future. Moreover, it is vital that we continue to develop space defense technology to protect our many satellites upon which modern life is dependent. Space technology is an area where we have still a distinct advantage, yet Obama has killed our nation’s space program. Lastly, our national security posture hasn’t been this bad since the 1930’s.

I think it would be fair to say we are not merely in decline, but rapidly approaching key tests during our descent that will determine our future. It is hard to say which will be the first key test, whether it will come in the form of severe economic stress as the interest rates rise on our outrageous national debt, or whether it will come in the choking of our economy by ever more far reaching regulations by the EPA and FCC, or whether it will come from foreign countries energized by our growing weakness. The only sure lesson of history is that the tests will come.

Our nation has proven resilient in the past, but in the past, we’ve been much better positioned to respond to challenges. In the past hundred years, we’ve faced the Depression and come through. But that was at a time when our massive excess industrial capacity sat untapped and we started from a point with no major deficits. We faced WWII and came through. But that was at a time when the other allied nations had strong militaries of their own, not the empty shells that they now have. We faced down the Soviet Union, but that was at a time when our military was at the pinnacle of its strength, not now when Obama has starved our military for funding, going so far as to change our national security posture from being able to fight two simultaneous wars to one. That was a change not based on any threat assessment, but rather a desire to divert the savings to his various welfare programs. And he has likewise overseen the devolution of our nuclear capacity — something that has maintained the peace in Europe for 75 years — because of his insane, utopian vision of a world without nuclear weapons. Somebody, please inform the North Koreans, the Iranians, and the other Middle Eastern nations now initiating their own nuclear weapons programs.

It is hard for me to believe that America will retain a dominant position in the world beyond another decade or so. Perhaps this would not matter if America was intrinsically evil as the left seems to think, or those who would replace us would be benign. The reality is that no nation is strong enough to take our place at the moment, and those who will vie for influence do not have a history of rule by law or democracy. Nor do I believe there is any leader we could elect in 2016 that could restore the Constitutional systems that have allowed us to flourish for much of the past two centuries.

That said, perhaps in response to the key tests and trials foreseeable on our national horizon, things might change. My pessimism is moderated by the reality that history has few straight lines, and great nations have rarely gone gentle into that good night. But my pessimism is made worse by the knowledge that, with key tests and trials come great costs in gold and in blood. The question is not whether America is in decline, but how low we must fall before we even begin to recover, and at what cost?

Bookworm Room : Guest blogger Wolf Howling was kind enough to give me a preview of his response to this week’s forum question. I don’t want to repeat what he said; I will just add to it:

I agree with him. Indeed, it’s part of why, even though my real-world work has slackened off, I’ve still been too demoralized to blog. The one thing I’d add to Wolf Howling’s list of reasons why we are not positioned to withstand tests as we once were is that we are not the same people we once were. Our immigrants once came for the freedom to seek wealth. Our immigrants now come for handouts that they then wire to the tyrannies back home. Our young people once thought that we brought freedom to the world. After fifty years of academic indoctrination, our young people now believe that we are evil.

It’s that last point that explains why I’m so deeply pessimistic. When a nation’s young people think that they and their country are unworthy, the ink is on the suicide pact. And when they’ve also been trained to think of themselves as fragile victims, you can bet that the first drop of blood spilled will seal that pact.

Oh, and of course there’s president Obama. First, read Michael Goodwin’s article about Obama, what he’s done to America and her allies, and what his goals are for Israel. Once you’ve read that article, then proceed to my last paragraph, immediately below:

Those who think Obama is a bad, incompetent president are completely wrong. He has proven himself to be incredibly smart and amazingly competent. We just misunderstood his goals.

The Right Planet :The first thing that comes to my mind: what is meant by “decline?” If we’re talking economically, I would have to say, how can anyone come to the conclusion we are not in a serious and precipitous decline? It is projected by the end of Barack Obama’s second term the national debt will have climbed to around $20 trillion. This is an utterly astonishing number! This represents a literal doubling of the national debt, which was around $10 trillion when he took office–more federal spending than all previous presidents combined. And, as far as I can see, the president and his ardent supporters could care less. Why? Such a crushing debt will fall on future generations, regardless of their political affiliations. I find that utterly unconscionable.

If I look at the current state of our military, which has been engaged in continuous combat operations for years, I see a purge of top-brass, officers and senior NCOs. Our Navy is at pre-WWI levels. The US Army has been slashed back to a mere 60,000 troops. And yet there are very serious threats looming on the horizon–such as ISIS, and Russia and China rattling their sabres. As Trevor Loudon, author of the book Barack Obama and the Enemies Within, has pointed out on numerous occasions our “allies are freaking out.” They wonder what has happened to America, and whether or not the United States will be in their corner should things on the world stage take an ugly turn.

And then there’s the culture. Instead of a “post-racial” America, which Barack Obama promised to bring about if he were elected president, I see a disturbing increase in racial animus, often times exacerbated by the president and the DOJ. Instead of attempting to deescalate tensions, more gas is poured on the proverbial fire. Why? To whose benefit? I also see a very disturbing trend in education–a literal dumbing down. I was unable to come to any other conclusion after having spent several months researching the Common Core curriculum. Learning is now being replaced with training. No longer is the primary function of public education to assist students to become independent thinkers, but rather compliant “workers” taught to dutifully follow along in the footsteps of the collective. Emotion trumps logic now. The goal is to replace learning with changing attitudes, beliefs, values and behaviors. C.S. Lewis once said (paraphrase), when education is supplanted by training, civilization dies. Unfortunately, I could probably write a book on the topic of America’s “decline.” But I never give up on all of the American people. I know too many Americans who are doing everything they can to push back against the decline. I should also state that I don’t pin all blame on Barack Obama. These disturbing patterns and trends go way back.

Sadly, I believe the decline is purposeful–a “managed decline” fostered and encouraged by nefarious forces. Once again, I must ask, to whose benefit?

Cui bono?

Laura Rambeau Lee,Right Reason: If you do not believe America is in decline, you must be one of the millions of illegal immigrants receiving free housing, clothes, schooling for your children, and medical care thanks to the benevolence of President Barack Hussein Obama. You know to whom I am referring… Those who left the hell hole of whatever failed socialist or communist country of their birth because their government could no longer provide even the most meager items needed to survive. They find the promise of abundance in America to be worth every sacrifice, knowing just being able to cross our border undetected is all they need to do to reap benefits truly needy American citizens can only dream about.

Yes, America is in decline. There is going to have to be a massive shift in the American population and their understanding of what is really going on if we are to have any hope of reversing the fundamental transformation of America. There has been ongoing and relentless indoctrination of our youth into believing all of the evils of the world are a result of the policies and actions of America. Education, particularly American History, has been perverted to fixate on the negative events as if isolated from the rest of the world and human civilization.

When I returned to college, a professor in one of my classes, The Cold War and After, explained that what is holding us back is nationalism. A proud self-proclaimed socialist, the class was taught by her along with a visiting professor from Moscow University.

It was interesting to hear them proclaim that American nationalism was standing in the way of achieving a global communist government. Historically, nationalism and nationalist propaganda were used to instill pride of one’s nationality and country, a “fatherland” if you will, in order to expand a country’s power. Today however, nationalism of any kind presents a challenge to those intent on establishing global governance. One nation cannot be favored over another and cultural, religious, and ethnically diverse populations must all learn to coexist in peace and harmony. Moral ambivalence is key to achieving this utopia.

The progressive left, along with a complicit media, engage in public humiliation and vilification of those who understand the exceptionalism of America and our Constitution. This is why the Tea Party is attacked. They are standing in the way of those intent on destroying the one truly free Republic in the world, the “last best hope of man on earth,” as President Reagan so eloquently affirmed. Public humiliation is a useful tool in the early stages of methodically planned coercion and destruction. It worked very well for Hitler until his power was established, at which point no one dare speak out against him under threat of imprisonment or death.

Americans who truly value saving our country from destruction must heed the admonition of Roman philosopher, politician, and orator Marcus Tullius Cicero: “A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.”

Americans must realize we have traitors and enemies residing in the highest levels of government undermining the very foundation of our republic if we are to have any hope of saving our country.

The Glittering Eye: I think the answer to the question depends somewhat on the context. If military power is meant, the answer is obviously that we are not in decline. Not only does the United States have the greatest ability to project force of any country on the planet, our military is the most tested and experienced. There is no other country in the world that can even match our military power in any real way.

I believe that those who think that our military power is in decline want to accomplish chores that can’t be achieved with military power. Our military can obliterate any enemy. It can’t ensure that we have no enemies.

If what is meant is more along the lines of is the United States changing in the right ways, on the right track, I’m afraid the answer is that it isn’t but that depends on the track you think we should be on. I would much rather see a confident, optimistic United States in which most people believe their lives will be better than those of their parents but that doesn’t seem to be how most of us feel.

Ask Marion: America is absolutely in decline! And we are definite a long way from being the country our Founding Fathers had envisioned and left us the tools to build.

In 2012 The Economic Collapse pointed to 34 signs that America is in decline… most of which have worsened since then!

#1 According to the World Bank, U.S. GDP accounted for 31.8 percent of all global economic activity in 2001. That number dropped to 21.6 percent in 2011. That is not just a decline – that is a freefall. Just check out the chart in this article.

#2 According to The Economist, the United States was the best place in the world to be born into back in 1988. Today, the United States is only tied for 16th place.

#3 The United States has fallen in the global economic competitiveness rankings compiled by the World Economic Forum for four years in a row.

#4 According to the Wall Street Journal, of the 40 biggest publicly traded corporate spenders, half of them plan to reduce capital expenditures in coming months.

#5 More than three times as many new homes were sold in the United States in 2005 as will be sold in 2012.

#6 America once had the greatest manufacturing cities on the face of the earth. Now many of our formerly great manufacturing cities have degenerated into festering hellholes. For example, the city of Detroit is on the verge of financial collapse, and one state lawmaker is now saying that “dissolving Detroit” should be looked at as an option.

#7 In 2007, the unemployment rate for the 20 to 29 age bracket was about 6.5 percent. Today, the unemployment rate for that same age group is about 13 percent.

#8 Back in 1950, more than 80 percent of all men in the United States had jobs. Today, less than 65 percent of all men in the United States have jobs.

#9 If you can believe it, approximately one out of every four American workers makes 10 dollars an hour or less.

#10 Sadly, 60 percent of the jobs lost during the last recession were mid-wage jobs, but 58 percent of the jobs created since then have been low wage jobs.

#11 Median household income in America has fallen for four consecutive years. Overall, it has declined by over $4000 during that time span.

#12 The U.S. trade deficit with China during 2011 was 28 times larger than it was back in 1990.

#26 In 1980, government transfer payments accounted for just 11.7 percent of all income. Today, government transfer payments account for more than 18 percent of all income.

#27 In November 2008, 30.8 million Americans were on food stamps. Today, 47.1 million Americans are on food stamps.

#28 Right now, one out of every four American children is on food stamps.

#29 According to one calculation the number of Americans on food stamps now exceeds the combined populations of “Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.”

#30 Back in 1965, only one out of every 50 Americans was on Medicaid. Today, one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid, and things are about to get a whole lot worse. It is being projected that Obamacare will add 16 million more Americans to the Medicaid rolls.

#31 In 2001, the U.S. national debt was less than 6 trillion dollars. Today, it is over 16 trillion dollars and it is increasing by more than 100 million dollars every single hour.

#32 The U.S. national debt in 2012 more than 23 times larger than it was when Jimmy Carter became president… and it keeps growing

#33 According to a PBS report in 2012, U.S. households that make $13,000 or less per year spend 9 percent of their incomes on lottery tickets. Could that possibly be accurate? Are people really that foolish?

#34 As the U.S. economy has declined, the American people have been downing more antidepressants and other prescription drugs than ever before. In fact, the American people spent 60 billion dollars more on prescription drugs in 2010 than they did in 2005.

Read or listen to almost every economic expert and they warn America is virtually moments from falling over the edge… They advise investing overseas; buying gold and silver; storing food, water, and ammunition; taking off the blinders and getting involved; and praying!

#35 America has now become a laughing stock around the world and considered weak.

· The highest rate of women dying due to complications of pregnancy and childbirth

And this will certainly not get better under ObamaCare in the Nanny State we now live in!!

Well, there you have it!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum. and every Tuesday morning, when we reveal the weeks’ nominees for Weasel of the Week!

And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.

It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it…or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?

The Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and the results are in for this week’s Watcher’s Council match up.

“”You see, it’s been our misfortune to have the wrong religion. Why didn’t we have the religion of the Japanese, who regard sacrifice for the Fatherland as the highest good? The Mohammedan religion too would have been more compatible to us than Christianity. Why did it have to be Christianity with its meekness and flabbiness?” – Adolf Hitler

“I studied the Qu’ran a great deal. I came away from that study with the conviction that by and large there have been few religions in the world as deadly to men as that of Muhammad. As far as I can see, it is the principal cause of the decadence so visible today in the Muslim world and, though less absurd than the polytheism of old, its social and political tendencies are in my opinion more to be feared, and I therefore regard it as a form of decadence rather than a form of progress in relation to paganism itself” – Alexis de Tocqueville

“All this talk of people who burn the Koran and nothing about the people who reacted in such a stupid way. We are always blaming the victim and not holding them — not most Muslims, but at least a large part of Muslim culture that doesn’t condemn their people… There is one religion in the world that kills you when you disagree with them and they say ‘look, we are a religion of peace and if you disagree we’ll f**king cut your head off, and nobody calls them on it — there are very few people that will call them on it. It’s like if Dad is a violent drunk and beats his kids, you don’t blame the kid because he set Dad off. You blame Dad because he’s a violent drunk”- Bill Maher

This week’s winning essay, Joshuapundit’s The Chicken Or The Egg? looks at some elements of Islamic culture and asks: is it Islam that promotes the extreme violence and misogyny associated with Muslim societies? Or is that just [art of a tribal society that persists in spite of Islam? Here’s a slice:

Unless you’re in a coma, you’ve probably noticed that a great many of the violent and barbaric acts in our modern world can be attributed to followers of Islam.

In the Islamic world today, aside from homicide bombings, jihad and terrorism directed against dar harb ( the part of the world not ruled by Islam), honor killings, female genital circumcision and other forms of violence against women are commonplace, and homosexuals are routinely brutalized and murdered. Non-Muslims are treated as barely human in much of the Islamic world, if they’re allowed to exist at all. Warfare carried out by Muslims is done with modern tools of the trade provided by the despised infidels, but is a relic of the good ol’ primitive and tribal days. Hostages, beheadings and the deliberate killing of civilians are all fair game, and the language of jihad is essentially the same heady stuff used back in the 7th century against the infidel. And through it all, there remains the miasma of seething violent rage at things like the Danish cartoons that simply doesn’t exist in other religious groups.

The question nobody wants to ask keeps floating to the surface: Is Islam to blame? Or, to put it another way, are the perpetrators simply bad Muslims or are they actually good ones who are simply more in tune with Mohammed’s message than the majority? Does Islam itself promote violence? Or are the acts simply a product of primitive tribal society that persists in spite of Islam?

Actually, this is a trick question. I personally believe that Islam and the primitive tribal culture combined back in the day to sustain each other and can’t be separated by their very nature…even though some valiant attempts have been made in the past, and are being made today.

Let’s look at honor killings, for example. Probably the oldest recorded one is in Genesis 34, when Jacob’s daughter Dinah was seduced (or raped, depending on how you interpret the text) by a man from the town of Shechem( modern day Nablus). Afterwards, Jacob’s sons Simeon and Levi instigated the killing of the town’s men in revenge. But the Torah also tells us how Jacob denounced the killings and actually took the time to bad mouth his sons for the deed from his deathbed. Not only that, but you’ll notice a profound difference from the Islamic way of handling this – the onus of punishment fell on the male, not the female.

his isn’t the only honor killing mentioned in the Bible, but they were never condoned or part of Jewish law, just merely reported.

Islam, on the other hand, not only sanctions honor killings but is quite clear about its position in the matter. Killing or flogging an adulteress or a female that has relations with a non-Muslim male are part of sharia ( Qu’ran: 4:15, for example) – provided an Islamic court orders the punishment rather than an individual male family member going off on his own.

Even at that, Islamic courts today in the Muslim world frequently view male family members taking the law into their own hands fairly leniently. In Jordan, for example, many brutal honor killings have been punished by as little as a three month sentence under Jordanian Public Law 340. Moreover, in the context of Islamic society such murderers are often celebrated and held up as role models. Just as homicide bombers and terrorists who kill infidel civilians often are.

But what if a Muslim feels himself disrespected and lives in say, Britain or New Jersey? If no Islamic courts are available, is it permissible to take the law into one’s own hands? Probably. There’s not much in the way of Islamic rulings or commentary on that particular subject, but the near silence of most Muslim clergy in the West when it comes to denouncing honor killings speaks volumes…one of those little inconvenient truths Western apologists for multiculturalism and Islam constantly run up against when a number of Muslim clerics themselves insist that honor killing, female genital mutilation, and stoning of adulterers are mandated by Islam. And, as you’ve probably guessed by now , that’s one of the unspoken reasons behind the push among many Muslims in the West for sharia courts to handle those messy domestic problems that come up with uppity females from time to time.

Violent death penalties for women caught in adultery is fairly typical of a primitive society, but only Islam continues the practice into the present day. No Christian court has ever condemned a woman to death for adultery. And although the death penalty for adultery is found in the Book of Leviticus, there is no record of such a sentence ever carried out by any Jewish court. The same is true of homosexuality; while both Christianity and Judaism consider it ‘a sin and an abomination’ only Islam clearly mandates the death penalty for such activities and carries it out in our present day.

In our non-Council category, the winner was Daniel Greenfield’s–Obama’s Treason Is The New Patriotism submitted by The Noisy Room. Daniel has some very hard hitting things to say about President Obama and a number of his questionable actions..and the tendency by the usual suspects to name anyone whom disagrees with the Regime a ‘traitor.’

Here are this week’s full results. GrEaT sAtAn”S gIrLfRiEnD and Rhymes With Right were unable to vote this week, but were not subject to the usual 2/3 vote penalty for not voting:

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum. and every Tuesday morning, when we reveal the weeks’ nominees for Weasel of the Week!

And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it...or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?

Every Tuesday, the Council nominates some of the slimiest, most despicable characters in public life for some deed of evil, cowardice or corruption they’ve performed. Then we vote to single out one particular Weasel for special mention, to whom we award the statuette of shame, our special, 100% plastic Golden Weasel. This week’s nominees were all truly slime-worthy and disgusting,but in the end the unanimous winner was….the envelope please..

The Regime’s Own Komedy King, ‘Director Of National Intelligence’ James Clapper!!

JoshuaPundit : Yes, good ol’ Jim Clapper, Obama’s ‘intelligence’ specialist, who referred to the Muslim Brotherhood as ‘a secular organization’ without even cracking a smile when testifying before congress. Yes, the laugh was in in his delivery – pompous, all knowing and put upon that he should even be questioned on such things by such mere peasants.

Since then, Jim Clapper has been good for a lot of laughs as he reliably shills for Obama’s failed foreign policy.

His latest caper? In his 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment for congress he totally delisted Iran as a state supporter of terrorism and Iran’s proxy Hezbollah as a terrorist group. And why not? They’re our allies now, President Obama says so, and so does James Clapper. so it must be true.

Yeah, they seem like a friendly bunch, don’t they? What’s wrong with them having nukes?

Hey, Jim Clapper, just like his boss in the Oval Office doesn’t see anything wrong with it? Why should we? And Hezbollah? Sure, before 9/11 they held the record for the terrorist group murdering the most Americans,but that was then and this is now.

Y’know, Clapper and a number of his buddies throughout out the Obama Administration like Robert Malley, Dalia Megahead, Huma Abedin, Mohamed Elibiary, Rashad Hussain, Salam al-Marayati and a number of others remind me a lot of how commies,their sympathizers and Soviet spies like Owen Lattimore, Alger Hiss, Harry Dexter White, Harry Hopkins, Nathan Gregory Silvermaster and lots of others infiltrated the Roosevelt and Truman administrations. Most of them weren’t high profile..they functioned behind the scenes as trusted behind the scenes advisers, apparatchniks and bureaucrats at various choke points where they could see and hear a lot and/or had the ear of people whom directly affected policy. They were the ultimate weasels of the Cold War, and between them they gave Stalin the atomic bomb, convinced Roosevelt to trust Stalin when he said he’d pull the Red Army out of Europe after the war, and duped Truman into allowing the Soviets to keep eastern Europe enslaved and bring the USSR into the UN.

I have a feeling that when the history of these times is written, some of the names I mentioned, perhaps even Mr. Clapper’s might just be mentioned as he ultimate weasels of their own time.So I think it’s only appropriate and fitting that Mr. Clapper receive this well earned Golden weasel…both for the weaselly deeds he’s already done and the one’s he’ll undoubtedly do in the future. Step up to the stage, James Clapper, and here’s your weasel!

Oh, the red stuff on the sides? Well, we had that done especially for you, kind of a symbolic tribute. Looks almost like blood, doesn’t it?

Well, there it is!

Check back next Tuesday to see who next week’s nominees for Weasel of the Week are!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum, and remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it...or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?

Welcome to the Watcher’s Council, a blogging group consisting of some of the most incisive blogs in the ‘sphere, and the longest running group of its kind in existence. Every week, the members nominate two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council.Then we vote on the best two posts, with the results appearing on Friday morning.

Council News:

This week, the Watcher’s Council is proud to welcome a new member, Don Surber. I’ve admired his work for quite some time, and we’re all glad to have him aboard. Please check out his fine site, and feast your eyes and brain matter on his Council debut below.

It’s time once again for the Watcher’s Council’s ‘Weasel Of The Week’ nominations, where we pick our choices to compete for the award of the famed Golden Weasel to a public figure who particularly deserves to be slimed and mocked for his or her dastardly deeds during the week. Every Tuesday morning, tune in for the Weasel of the Week nominations!

Here are this weeks’ nominees….

New York’s comedy Newspaper, The Daily News

The Noisy Room : My submission this week is the NY Daily News for labeling the 47 US Senators as traitors, all Republicans, who sent a signed letter to Iran pointing out the minor detail that any agreement made between Obama and Iran without approval by the Senate is unconstitutional.

Let’s get this straight… the traitors here are Barack Obama and any on the Marxist Left who cut a deal with Iran for nuclear capabilities without Congressional approval, by skirting constitutional law and by seeking UN intervention. You don’t get to redefine ‘treason’ as you see fit. I think you have the words ‘patriot’ and ‘traitor’ confused. The first rule of treason is to call the other guy a traitor. You see the true treasonous responses in President Obama’s own reply to the letter which encouraged all this loose talk about treason. “It’s somewhat ironic to see some members of Congress wanting to make common cause with the hardliners in Iran,” he told reporters. “It’s an unusual coalition.” And what would be an act of treachery without the Queen of Transparency, Hillary Clinton, who held a press conference ostensibly to explain why she hid her work product at the State Department and then made similar statements. Although no one asked her about the GOP letter, she gave her opinion: “Either these senators were trying to be helpful to the Iranians, or harmful to commander-in-chief in the middle of high stakes international diplomacy.” Typical Leftist bull crap – blaming those who are trying to save the Republic as being in cahoots with the Iranians when it is so blatantly the other way around. Spoken with a true forked tongue. The Marxists even stooped to calling Tom Cotton, “Tehran Tom.” How very Orwellian to brand someone with that moniker who went to Harvard Law School and enlisted in the US Army to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Right Planet : Following the shooting of two police officers in Ferguson, Missouri, by a 20-year-old thug, Jeffrey Williams, MSNBC’s resident hothead, Ed Schultz, recommended disarming the police. Let the officers carry nightsticks instead, said Sgt. Schultz. Wuut? I can hear it now: “We’re taking fire! Grab your nightsticks!!” Apparently Mr. Ed believes only criminals and thugs should be armed with guns. Brilliant. I mean, come on. He’s just trolling us now.

The Totally Disloyal And Brain Dead Associated Students of University of California, Irvine (ASUCI) !

Ask Marion :Yep, you heard that right… The Associated Students of University of California (ASUCI), a California State University in the USA, wanted to stop flying the American flag on their campus.They passed a resolution on March 3rd that would remove the Stars & Stripes along with every other flag from the lobby of a complex housing the offices of the student government… or fly the flag of every ethnic group and country that was represented on that campus.

“Designing a culturally inclusive space aims to remove barriers that create undue effort and separation by planning and designing spaces that enable everyone to participate equally and confidentially,” read the resolution authored by Matthew Guevara.

The resolution passed 6 to 4, with two abstentions. 6 confused progressives, 4 patriots and 2 politicians in the making.

The ASUCI president and a young patriot, Reza Zomorrodian, was very upset over the student government’s actions and was pushing for a veto.

“It’s an attack on American values,” he said. “A lot of people want to come to the United States for a reason – it’s because of the freedoms we have.”;

He went on to say “Only six people voted for this. We have 22,000 undergrads here. Six people made this decision. The UC Irvine has made huge contributions to bettering this country. This is an elected body that made a decision for the whole and will suffer the consequences of making that decision.”

After the complaints and pressure from many parents, (most) students at the school who disagreed, outside parties, and Reza Zomorrodian,it has already been overturned. This was even too much for progressive California, or as Todd Starnes of Fox News wrote, “This is even bizarre for the yoga and granola bunch in California”.

The scary part though is that there are far too many people on our university campuses around the country who think this is normal thinking!

The Regime’s Own Komedy King, ‘Director Of National Intelligence’ James Clapper!!

JoshuaPundit : Yes, good ol’ Jim Clapper, Obama’s ‘intelligence’ specialist, who referred to the Muslim Brotherhood as ‘a secular organization’ without even cracking a smile when testifying before congress. Yes, the laugh was in in his delivery – pompous, all knowing and put upon that he should even be questioned on such things by such mere peasants.

Since then, Jim Clapper has been good for a lot of laughs as he reliably shills for Obama’s failed foreign policy.

His latest caper? In his 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment for congress he totally delisted Iran as a state supporter of terrorism and Iran’s proxy Hezbollah as a terrorist group. And why not? They’re our allies now, President Obama says so, and so does James Clapper. so it must be true…

Yeah, they seem like a friendly bunch, don’t they? What’s wrong with them having nukes?

Well, there it is. What a despicable group of Weasels…ANY OF THEM COULD WIN! Check back Thursday to see which Weasel walks off with the statuette of shame!

Make sure to tune in every Monday for the Watcher’s Forum.

And remember, every Wednesday, the Council has its weekly contest with the members nominating two posts each, one written by themselves and one written by someone from outside the group for consideration by the whole Council. The votes are cast by the Council, and the results are posted on Friday morning.It’s a weekly magazine of some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere, and you won’t want to miss it...or any of the other fantabulous Watcher’s Council content.

And don’t forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter..’cause we’re cool like that, y’know?